How long does a dead animal smell?

I consider myself a pretty intelligent person, but I have absolutely no idea how long a dead animal smells. You might wonder why that would even come up, but unless you’re really into death, there’s really only one reason a person would need to know how long does a dead animal smell. It’s because there’s a dead animal in my wall.

I’ve been extremely busy lately, finishing up my master’s program. I’ve got my classes, my school work, my full-time job, and my internship, so I don’t spend a lot of time at home. Pretty much, I’m just at home to study and sleep, and sometimes I’ll grab something out of the fridge to eat. Otherwise, I’m at school or at work and eating in the car or with one of my friends in the same masters program.

So, you can imagine my surprise when I walked in the apartment and was knocked over by the most atrocious smell I’d ever had the displeasure of smelling in my short lifetime. Now, I haven’t noticed anything like rats in the apartment or mouse droppings or anything else, so it took me a while to even consider the fact it might be a dead animal in the wall. I scoured the apartment that evening, despite my desperate need to get more work done. I just couldn’t focus on anything other than finding the source of the stench, and wondering how long does a dead animal smell.

I figured a dead animal will smell as it rots, so until it’s completely rotted or desiccated, it will stink up the place. Of course, this happened in the early spring, which made me grateful for small favors. What if this had happened in the summer? Summers can get pretty intense around here, and if you added in humidity, I’m sure the smell would have been even worse. As it was, it was awful, and I needed to do something fast.

I finally determined the smell was not food rotting in the kitchen or a forgotten sandwich in the bedroom, and that the smell was coming from the living room, which was a sparse room that was hardly ever used. I noticed there were several flies in that room, too, which had completely ignored the forgotten bedroom-sandwich and were focused instead on a patch of wall. Sniffing warily, I convinced myself the smell was stronger there than anywhere else. That’s when I finally realized it must be a dead animal in the wall.

How long does a dead animal smell? I wasn’t sure how long the smell had been there. Obviously, it had gotten progressively worse, but I had been too busy, and wasn’t home enough to notice before that night.

Well, it wasn’t too late to call up a friend and spend the night over there. In the morning, I’d get the apartment manager to get someone to remove the dead animal out of the wall. Hopefully, they’d do it fast enough that I wouldn’t have to find out the answer to the burning question, how long does a dead animal smell.